6 ms·

Disclaimer: I can't really vouch for any of this, but let me tell you what's being discussed in the press over here. This is Government's version and it shows.

by narag 1y ago

Disclaimer: I can't really vouch for any of this, but let me tell you what's being discussed in the press over here. This is Government's version and it shows. REE boss was put there by the ruling party. Still they try to paint REE as a private operator now. It's not. Like many other orgs, it's a mix of private and public capital, ultimately controled by the government. It's suspected that the blackout was caused because she overruled technicians' opinion, looking for a solar % record. Not "enough thermal power stations" carefully avoids mentioning nuclear, that they want to erradicate. Private companies are requesting the records of CECOEL conversation to be published, some have leaked their logs. In one of those, REE technicians readily admit that oscilations are caused by not enough nuclear in the mix.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
toomuchtodo 1y ago
Doesn't have to be nuclear, can be anything that provides reactive power and grid services, i.e. grid forming battery storage. The problem is this service is needed on the Spanish grid, but isn't paid for in the market. Pay for it and the grid services will be provided. Resources below. Mind you, doesn't have to be a Tesla battery, just has to be a battery with power controls (grid forming) and some lithium cells for fast response (vs sodium for longer duration discharge). China launches world’s first grid-forming sodium-ion battery storage plant - https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/03/china-launches-worlds-first-grid-forming-sodium-ion-battery-storage-plant/ https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/03/china-launches-worlds-fi... - June 3rd, 2025 ("With a total investment of over CNY 460 million [$63.8 million] and occupying 34k square metres, the Baochi plant is designed for an installed capacity of 200MW/400MWh. Based on a dual daily charge-discharge cycle, it can regulate up to 580 GWh annually — enough to power 270,000 households, with 98 per cent of its energy sourced from renewables. The facility supports more than 30 local wind and solar power stations, alleviating the impact of intermittent supply and facilitating the integration of high shares of renewables into the grid.") Tesla Megapack in Texas Supports the Grid and Keeps the Lights On [Gambit Energy Storage] - https://www.tesla.com/videos/gambit-megapack https://www.tesla.com/videos/gambit-megapack - September 30, 2021 Tesla’s giant battery in Australia [Hornsdale Power Reserve] reduced grid service cost by 90% - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17051066 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17051066 - May 2018 Tesla Powerpacks Balancing the Grid in Terhills, Belgium [video] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVHQFrGzThg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVHQFrGzThg - May 14, 2018
- spspeaker 1y ago
  Grid forming services are indeed paid for, according to this very same article: > Power plants "should have controlled voltage and, moreover, many of them were economically remunerated to do so. They did not absorb all the reactive power that was expected," Aagesen said.
  - toomuchtodo 1y ago
    It is possible I misread or misunderstood something on the topic with regards to compensation for grid services in the article. With that said, before jumping to solutioning (although I am a strong proponent of batteries based on their performance, capabilities, and cost as of this comment), I would like to see more information and data as to which generators were signaled to change their output when the grid started to fault and were unable or unwilling to (failure to appropriately manage output and/or field excitation to absorb reactive power, etc) and if improvements to the electricity market are required. Without root cause, we cannot effectively solve.
    - toomuchtodo 1y ago
      Spain had resources to prevent a blackout, but they didn't respond - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44311685 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44311685 - June 2025 https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/06/spanish-blackout-report-power-plants-meant-to-stabilize-voltage-didnt/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/06/spanish-blackout-rep... > The Iberian grid is capable of handling this sort of thing. But the grid operator only scheduled 10 power plants to handle voltage regulation on the 28th, which the report notes is the lowest total it had committed to in all of 2025 up to that point. The report found that a number of those plants failed to respond properly to the grid operators, and a few even responded in a way that contributed to the surging voltages. > As the voltages rose, they approached a threshold at which power plants need to disconnect from the grid to protect their equipment. But the report found that some of the plants disconnected before the threshold was reached. And with each disconnection, the voltages on the grid continued to rise, causing plants to disconnect in multiple Spanish provinces. At that point, things spun out of control, with the grid frequency dropping. That led to it falling out of sync with its connection to France, causing the shutdown. The blackout had long since passed the point of intervention. > It may be tempting to view the cascading failures as a sign of incompetence on the part of the grid operators. But these are the same operators who managed to restore the process of black-starting the grid to normal operations within a matter of hours. There should (and undoubtedly will) be questions about the low number of plants dedicated to grid stabilization, but that can be handled with a simple policy fix. An equally focused correction can likely address any problems at the problematic facility that triggered the whole chain of events. > The real issue is why so much hardware on the grid didn't follow its operating specifications, either disconnecting early or failing to respond properly to the calls for stabilization.
spspeaker 1y ago
[flagged]
gred 1y ago
> REE boss was put there by the ruling party. Yeah, these public / private entities can get ridiculous. Her background is legal and political: Secretary of Women and Equality, Spokesperson for Housing, Minister of Housing, State Secretary of Housing and Urban Construction, etc. But she's a party loyalist and she took a few business classes, so it's all good.
- serial_dev 1y ago
  I mean it could be good enough, as long as she listens to the experts and doesn’t think that “these nerds are preventing me from making history and breaking records” (assuming what parent comment says is true).
  - gred 1y ago
    Sure, but even better would be if she had experience in the industry to judge tactical advice she is given and set strategic direction. Otherwise the best she can do is "not get in the way".
    - touisteur 1y ago
      But then you get complaints/problems of revolving doors and how's she supposed to reform an industry that she will have to go back working for again after her tenure as minister or secretary - assuming she wants to eat and feed her family using her hard-earned industry experience.
    - jaoane 1y ago
      It’s incredible that here of all places you will have someone justify a person who’s completely unqualified running something as important as a country’s electrical network. I wonder if they’d say the same if this had happened in, say, Hungary.
    - motorest 1y ago
      > Otherwise the best she can do is "not get in the way". Playing devil's advocate, policy can be set by inertia (i.e., no one is fired for buying IBM). So a government loyalist can have the motivation to implement a policy change that breaks away from conservative biases towards how a problem is solved. You already see how the criticism is that things weren't done as they were always done, aka "Don't touch it to not break it". The problem with this approach is that conservative approaches are not inherently safer: their primary value is to serve as scapegoat and create responsibility voids. See for example how some critics attack how nuclear was not singled out as baseline, when under this scenario nuclear would be by design the first system being pulled from the network. Spain is being criticized for implementing a policy to shift the country's energy supply away from fossil+nuclear and towards renewables. Naturally there will be growing pains. Attacking the regulator based on shifts in policy only underline that the attacks are political, thus complaining that the top stop was handed to a politician actually justifies the move as clearly the position is responsible for managing the political side of the policy shift.
7952 1y ago
Well nuclear is a thermal power station.
mocmoc 1y ago
100% this. In the conversations , it's cristal clear
AshamedCaptain 1y ago
> Private companies are requesting the records of CECOEL conversation to be published, some have leaked their logs. In one of those, REE technicians readily admit that oscilations are caused by not enough nuclear in the mix. And where are those leaks, if one may ask? French-side the only generation station that actually was ejected from the network that day was, precisely, a nuclear power plant. [1] A non-specific "moar nuclear!" cry seems therefore a bit hard to believe. [1] https://www.edf.fr/la-centrale-nucleaire-de-golfech/les-actualites-de-la-centrale-nucleaire-de-golfech/actualite-de-l-unite-de-production-ndeg1 https://www.edf.fr/la-centrale-nucleaire-de-golfech/les-actu...
- Etheryte 1y ago
  This doesn't make the point you think it makes. Nuclear power plants are supposed to go offline in unstable grid conditions. This ensures they don't overheat, equipment isn't damaged, and that they can be taken offline in a safe, rather than unsafe manner.
  - AshamedCaptain 1y ago
    Your point is not really a point either: every power plant can be ejected from the network in such cases, and not just nuclear ones. The remark here is that it precisely happened to a nuclear first.
    - cryptonector 1y ago
      Nuclear can't ramp up or down fast. As the grid loses generation capacity the load on the base-load type capacity becomes too variable and that capacity has to be brought offline. It's that simple. Nuclear wasn't ejected because there was too much of it but because there was not enough capacity of all types, especially of the gas-fired type that can most readily respond to solar and wind drop-off.
      - AshamedCaptain 1y ago
        My point is "moar nuclear" guarantees nothing as evidenced by what happened _in France_ (hint: not exactly the same as in Spain even if same underlying direct cause). Your remark, at best, only adds to my point, and is not a counterargument to mine. And for the record, very few power stations can ramp up "fast" or "down" for the level required here -- this is not something that uniquely applies to nuclear. Even oft-quoted gas stations still measure "ramp up" in hours.
cryptonector 1y ago
Yeah, this is a miscalculation, a miscalculation of the -you know- _political_ sort. It's not some junior employee's math error. It was _policy_. It blew up in the policy maker's face.
robocat 1y ago
> REE technicians readily admit that oscilations are caused by not enough nuclear in the mix Any argument using the words "nuclear" or "inertia" are incorrect (I suspect often downstream of misdirection caused by the incumbents). A power network is supposed to be reliable, and it is up to the regulator to create the internal incentives and restrictions such that the network remains reliable as new generation is added. Other countries have successfully designed their electricity market incentives so that solar provides synthetic inertia, and manages reactive power, and so that voltage cutoffs (over or under) don't destabilise the grid. The regulator failed to design a stable network. If they were told to run it in an unstable manner, it is up to them to cover their arse.
- cryptonector 1y ago
  > If they were told to run it in an unstable manner, it is up to them to cover their arse. With you up to this point. Screw that ass covering. Admit the [policy] error and drop the idiotic policy and get back to normal. No need to ass-cover.
cryptonector 1y ago
Nuclear isn't the only issue. It's the lack of sufficient online gas-fired and hydro and battery peak-load capacity. There might not have been enough base-load capacity either, in which case all the peak-load capacity being online would not be enough -- in this case then yes, more nuclear (and coal) would have helped.

by narag 1y ago

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

toomuchtodo 1y ago

Doesn't have to be nuclear, can be anything that provides reactive power and grid services, i.e. grid forming battery storage. The problem is this service is needed on the Spanish grid, but isn't paid for in the market. Pay for it and the grid services will be provided. Resources below. Mind you, doesn't have to be a Tesla battery, just has to be a battery with power controls (grid forming) and some lithium cells for fast response (vs sodium for longer duration discharge). China launches world’s first grid-forming sodium-ion battery storage plant - https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/03/china-launches-worlds-first-grid-forming-sodium-ion-battery-storage-plant/ https://www.ess-news.com/2025/06/03/china-launches-worlds-fi... - June 3rd, 2025 ("With a total investment of over CNY 460 million [$63.8 million] and occupying 34k square metres, the Baochi plant is designed for an installed capacity of 200MW/400MWh. Based on a dual daily charge-discharge cycle, it can regulate up to 580 GWh annually — enough to power 270,000 households, with 98 per cent of its energy sourced from renewables. The facility supports more than 30 local wind and solar power stations, alleviating the impact of intermittent supply and facilitating the integration of high shares of renewables into the grid.") Tesla Megapack in Texas Supports the Grid and Keeps the Lights On [Gambit Energy Storage] - https://www.tesla.com/videos/gambit-megapack https://www.tesla.com/videos/gambit-megapack - September 30, 2021 Tesla’s giant battery in Australia [Hornsdale Power Reserve] reduced grid service cost by 90% - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17051066 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17051066 - May 2018 Tesla Powerpacks Balancing the Grid in Terhills, Belgium [video] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVHQFrGzThg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVHQFrGzThg - May 14, 2018

spspeaker 1y ago
Grid forming services are indeed paid for, according to this very same article: > Power plants "should have controlled voltage and, moreover, many of them were economically remunerated to do so. They did not absorb all the reactive power that was expected," Aagesen said.
- toomuchtodo 1y ago
  It is possible I misread or misunderstood something on the topic with regards to compensation for grid services in the article. With that said, before jumping to solutioning (although I am a strong proponent of batteries based on their performance, capabilities, and cost as of this comment), I would like to see more information and data as to which generators were signaled to change their output when the grid started to fault and were unable or unwilling to (failure to appropriately manage output and/or field excitation to absorb reactive power, etc) and if improvements to the electricity market are required. Without root cause, we cannot effectively solve.
  - toomuchtodo 1y ago
    Spain had resources to prevent a blackout, but they didn't respond - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44311685 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44311685 - June 2025 https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/06/spanish-blackout-report-power-plants-meant-to-stabilize-voltage-didnt/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2025/06/spanish-blackout-rep... > The Iberian grid is capable of handling this sort of thing. But the grid operator only scheduled 10 power plants to handle voltage regulation on the 28th, which the report notes is the lowest total it had committed to in all of 2025 up to that point. The report found that a number of those plants failed to respond properly to the grid operators, and a few even responded in a way that contributed to the surging voltages. > As the voltages rose, they approached a threshold at which power plants need to disconnect from the grid to protect their equipment. But the report found that some of the plants disconnected before the threshold was reached. And with each disconnection, the voltages on the grid continued to rise, causing plants to disconnect in multiple Spanish provinces. At that point, things spun out of control, with the grid frequency dropping. That led to it falling out of sync with its connection to France, causing the shutdown. The blackout had long since passed the point of intervention. > It may be tempting to view the cascading failures as a sign of incompetence on the part of the grid operators. But these are the same operators who managed to restore the process of black-starting the grid to normal operations within a matter of hours. There should (and undoubtedly will) be questions about the low number of plants dedicated to grid stabilization, but that can be handled with a simple policy fix. An equally focused correction can likely address any problems at the problematic facility that triggered the whole chain of events. > The real issue is why so much hardware on the grid didn't follow its operating specifications, either disconnecting early or failing to respond properly to the calls for stabilization.

spspeaker 1y ago

[flagged]

gred 1y ago

> REE boss was put there by the ruling party. Yeah, these public / private entities can get ridiculous. Her background is legal and political: Secretary of Women and Equality, Spokesperson for Housing, Minister of Housing, State Secretary of Housing and Urban Construction, etc. But she's a party loyalist and she took a few business classes, so it's all good.

serial_dev 1y ago
I mean it could be good enough, as long as she listens to the experts and doesn’t think that “these nerds are preventing me from making history and breaking records” (assuming what parent comment says is true).
- gred 1y ago
  Sure, but even better would be if she had experience in the industry to judge tactical advice she is given and set strategic direction. Otherwise the best she can do is "not get in the way".
  - touisteur 1y ago
    But then you get complaints/problems of revolving doors and how's she supposed to reform an industry that she will have to go back working for again after her tenure as minister or secretary - assuming she wants to eat and feed her family using her hard-earned industry experience.
  - jaoane 1y ago
    It’s incredible that here of all places you will have someone justify a person who’s completely unqualified running something as important as a country’s electrical network. I wonder if they’d say the same if this had happened in, say, Hungary.
  - motorest 1y ago
    > Otherwise the best she can do is "not get in the way". Playing devil's advocate, policy can be set by inertia (i.e., no one is fired for buying IBM). So a government loyalist can have the motivation to implement a policy change that breaks away from conservative biases towards how a problem is solved. You already see how the criticism is that things weren't done as they were always done, aka "Don't touch it to not break it". The problem with this approach is that conservative approaches are not inherently safer: their primary value is to serve as scapegoat and create responsibility voids. See for example how some critics attack how nuclear was not singled out as baseline, when under this scenario nuclear would be by design the first system being pulled from the network. Spain is being criticized for implementing a policy to shift the country's energy supply away from fossil+nuclear and towards renewables. Naturally there will be growing pains. Attacking the regulator based on shifts in policy only underline that the attacks are political, thus complaining that the top stop was handed to a politician actually justifies the move as clearly the position is responsible for managing the political side of the policy shift.

7952 1y ago

Well nuclear is a thermal power station.

mocmoc 1y ago

100% this. In the conversations , it's cristal clear

AshamedCaptain 1y ago

> Private companies are requesting the records of CECOEL conversation to be published, some have leaked their logs. In one of those, REE technicians readily admit that oscilations are caused by not enough nuclear in the mix. And where are those leaks, if one may ask? French-side the only generation station that actually was ejected from the network that day was, precisely, a nuclear power plant. [1] A non-specific "moar nuclear!" cry seems therefore a bit hard to believe. [1] https://www.edf.fr/la-centrale-nucleaire-de-golfech/les-actualites-de-la-centrale-nucleaire-de-golfech/actualite-de-l-unite-de-production-ndeg1 https://www.edf.fr/la-centrale-nucleaire-de-golfech/les-actu...

Etheryte 1y ago
This doesn't make the point you think it makes. Nuclear power plants are supposed to go offline in unstable grid conditions. This ensures they don't overheat, equipment isn't damaged, and that they can be taken offline in a safe, rather than unsafe manner.
- AshamedCaptain 1y ago
  Your point is not really a point either: every power plant can be ejected from the network in such cases, and not just nuclear ones. The remark here is that it precisely happened to a nuclear first.
  - cryptonector 1y ago
    Nuclear can't ramp up or down fast. As the grid loses generation capacity the load on the base-load type capacity becomes too variable and that capacity has to be brought offline. It's that simple. Nuclear wasn't ejected because there was too much of it but because there was not enough capacity of all types, especially of the gas-fired type that can most readily respond to solar and wind drop-off.
    - AshamedCaptain 1y ago
      My point is "moar nuclear" guarantees nothing as evidenced by what happened _in France_ (hint: not exactly the same as in Spain even if same underlying direct cause). Your remark, at best, only adds to my point, and is not a counterargument to mine. And for the record, very few power stations can ramp up "fast" or "down" for the level required here -- this is not something that uniquely applies to nuclear. Even oft-quoted gas stations still measure "ramp up" in hours.

cryptonector 1y ago

Yeah, this is a miscalculation, a miscalculation of the -you know- _political_ sort. It's not some junior employee's math error. It was _policy_. It blew up in the policy maker's face.

robocat 1y ago

> REE technicians readily admit that oscilations are caused by not enough nuclear in the mix Any argument using the words "nuclear" or "inertia" are incorrect (I suspect often downstream of misdirection caused by the incumbents). A power network is supposed to be reliable, and it is up to the regulator to create the internal incentives and restrictions such that the network remains reliable as new generation is added. Other countries have successfully designed their electricity market incentives so that solar provides synthetic inertia, and manages reactive power, and so that voltage cutoffs (over or under) don't destabilise the grid. The regulator failed to design a stable network. If they were told to run it in an unstable manner, it is up to them to cover their arse.

cryptonector 1y ago
> If they were told to run it in an unstable manner, it is up to them to cover their arse. With you up to this point. Screw that ass covering. Admit the [policy] error and drop the idiotic policy and get back to normal. No need to ass-cover.

cryptonector 1y ago

Nuclear isn't the only issue. It's the lack of sufficient online gas-fired and hydro and battery peak-load capacity. There might not have been enough base-load capacity either, in which case all the peak-load capacity being online would not be enough -- in this case then yes, more nuclear (and coal) would have helped.